What is the best Avios credit card? (Part 1: comparing sign-up bonuses)

What is the best credit card for earning Avios points? This is not as easy an answer as you might think and beginners to this hobby may not be aware of the full range of cards which are available. You have more options than you may think.

Whilst there are the BA and Lloyds / TSB cards which issue Avios miles directly, there are other cards which offer points which can be converted into Avios points. If you are intent on squeezing out every free Avios that you possibly can, you might want to get these cards as well – just not all at the same time ….

If you applied for every single credit card which offers Avios points or points which could be converted to Avios, you would earn over 100,000 Avios from the sign-up bonuses!

But which of these is the best credit card for earning Avios? Today I am focussing purely on sign-up bonuses. Tomorrow I will compare the same cards in terms of their day-to-day earning capacity.

You should note that, whilst some of these cards offer points which convert to Avios, this is not necessarily the best use of them. The 60,000 IHG Rewards Club points from their Premium Visa would get you a free night at many Holiday Inn hotels, for example, which is probably a better deal than 12,000 Avios.

Some of these cards offer a higher bonus if you are referred. You can find full details of these in the relevant entry on our ‘Credit Cards Update‘ page.

£24 annual fee. Issuer: Lloyds. There is no sign up bonus. However, there is a ‘refer a friend’ scheme for existing cardholders which will earn you 4,500 Avios points for signing up. If you need someone to refer you, email me at raffles [at] headforpoints.co.uk and I will be happy to help.

No fee. Issuer: Tesco Bank. There is no sign up bonus. However, once you have applied, you can claim 1,000 Clubcard points (2,400 Avios when converted) by sending in a ‘refer a friend’ form to say that you were recommended by someone. Email me at raffles [at] headforpoints.co.uk for a referral form. If you have recently got the Tesco card you can still retrospectively claim 1,000 Clubcard points for being referred.

The Lloyds Premier Avios cards, TSB Avios cards and the HSBC Premier card are not included on this list because they do not offer a sign-up bonus.

Tomorrow, I will look at the earning rate on all of these cards.

(Disclaimer: Head for Points is a journalistic website. Nothing here should be construed as financial advice, and it is your own responsibility to ensure that any product is right for your circumstances. Recommendations are based primarily on the ability to earn miles and points and do not consider interest rates, service levels or any impact on your credit history.)

And yet, AMEX acceptance is a widespread norm there and stuff costs generally cheaper. Economy of scale and/or competitive market with serious marketing offers available to nearly everyone.

Compare 50,000 bonus on US United card to 15,000 on UK card, etc. In the UK, “the serious offers” are only available to a limited class of premium borrowers/higher spenders, ones that pay fee to hold Platinum AMEX.

The impact of EU regulation to reduce interchange on Visa/MC has made the high spender market less lucrative for banks in the UK, and so only Amex or banks issuing cards on an Amex platform get involved. No bank in the UK could give 1.25 Avios/$ (2 Avios/£) on a Visa card like Chase without losing money on every single transaction, and they would certainly need to revise their rewards as soon as EU regulations kick in. Of course this is more relevant to ongoing rewards rather than sign-up bonuses, but the better the margin is on ongoing spend, the more you can give up-front.

Differences in interchange rates are tiny compared with differences in VAT/sales tax on the purchase of most items in the UK versus US, hence the difference in how much things cost.

My fear is that the impact of VISA’s new rates from 1 Jan will cause EU merchants to demand lower rates from Amex too. Or we might just see a reduction in the number of merchants willing to suffer Amex interchange costs when VISA/MC will be charging a fraction of 1%.

Either way, it’s not looking good for us with loyalty schemes devaluing their points; BA effectively removing long-haul premium redemption opportunities for many destinations; Tesco reducing the number of CC-earning opportunities and avios conversion bonuses (I cannot remember the last time I saw a double points coupon); and the EU slashing the interchange fee that fuels the bread-and-butter credit card earning opportunities!

The best Avios generator credit card remains initially taking the free Amex Gold card and then upgrading to Platinum. you get at least 40K points via referral, with a further 2K points possible. You also end up with 2 additional lounge passes. This is 2-4K points better than just taking the platinum directly.

The T&C of your card change when you upgrade to Platinum, so you are not eligible for the anniversary bonus of 7,500 MR points for £15,000 spent in the previous 12 calendar months as that only applies to the Gold Charge Card.

I took out the Gold, qualified for its initial spend bonus and then upgraded to Platinum (and pocketed the upgrade spend bonus on that card) over the holiday season last year. Process was very easy.

First place on the list is given to the Plat card. There is no anniversary bonus for this card. If you decide that is the right card for you, due to the other benefits, then applying first for the gold card and then upgrading to the Plat loses you nothing, but gains you at least an extra 6K points for an extra £1K of spend (assuming no referral which is in keeping with the original article)
new plat + £2K spend = 32K points
new gold +£2K spend + upgrade + £1K spend =38K points (possibly 40K depending on your gold spend) + 2 lounge pass cards.

You would have to be sure to use the 2 lounge passes you get for your gold card before you upgrade – as far as I know, once you no longer have the Gold card, the associated lounge card is no longer valid.

This article is just about sign-up bonuses, but don’t forget the 2-4-1 voucher with some cards. This was the clincher for me, since I intend to use it for a First seat to Vancouver normally costing 150,000 Avios. So it’s very much a question of which best suits your personal circumstances – thanks Rob for doing the leg work.

Incidentally I have seen people advertising on eBay that they will propose you (to get the reward) and pay YOU.

I hate to burst your bubble but BA stopped the first class cabin on the Vancouver flights last month as they weren’t going to upgrade it from the old First Class product due to the eventual retirement of the 747s that fly that route. You may still get seated in it, but the service will be that of Club World, but it will mean you’ll save 50k avios!

What about First class to Rio from LHR – do you know whether this is still running? It does not show as an option on the BA availability checker map thingy, however when you manually search for it it is an option? Thanks

I wouldn’t say it’s a piece of cake, but it’s definitely possible to get the full £25 paid directly into your bank account. Maybe Garry’s method is different from mine, but I’m not going to post it here as some idiot is going to go overboard, and one must tread extremely carefully with this route or you risk more than being banned from Amex for life. I would say for each virtual address you own you can do one card per 72 hours. This method is posted on a public forum which doesn’t see much activity

Indeed lol – have got the student Prime locked in so this would be a disappointing additional benefit for me (although at least would be a bit more practical than some of the benefits they come up with!)